Heaving Bosoms Reading Embrace 2022

 It's here, the 2022 Heaving Bosoms Reading Embrace! I am a fan of the Heaving Bosoms podcast and love trying to find books that fit the prompts that are jokes from their show! It's hosted by Erin and Melody and they usually have me cracking up. They have great banter between them and I love listening to them as a pick me up. I posted the embrace I did in 2021, so check out my embrace for more ideas.

They go super simple. It's 20 prompts and you can fill them out however you want. They usually do a podcast episode on January reading through everyone that submitted their embrace and it's lots of fun. I remember a couple years ago somebody just did the Mummy and had crazy fun explanations on how it fit each of the prompts. It's not super strict and you can get as creative as you want to meet each prompt. If you haven't tried doing a readathon or reading challenge before, I think this one is a great option since it's only 20 prompts and you have all year to finish it! If you want to learn more, check out their website for more information. They also have a printable pdf of the prompts. Usually in their facebook group there's also a link to a google sheet that's another option to submit your embrace when done (it's what I usually do).

Okay, let's do this! Below are the 20 prompts. As I read throughout the year I'll fill in prompts where I can. When there's only a couple left that are more oddball I'll pick up a book specifically for that. This isn't quite a tbr post, but I'll put some quick fire ideas I have below.

1) Keep Being a Badass

2) Lady Love

3) HB Author

4) Bonkers Romance

5) Scientists in 2022

6) Chekov's Grandma

7) Catch My Farts

8) A Light Kidnap

9) Jimmi Simpson's Robot Adventure

10) Prelude to a Wet Hump

11) St. Vincent Would Always

12) Englandtimes Highlander Vegas

13) Stay Golden Horny Girl

14) Doing 1920s Laundry

15) Forest Bed

16) Murder Robe

17) Ancient Egyptian Glory Hole

18) Pool Floaty Fart Sounds

19) Jazz Bagpipes

20) Funny Joke Dancing

🤗 For HB author I'll probably be using Victoria Aveline once again. I found her thanks to the Facebook group and her next book in the Clecanian series comes out today (January 12th)!

🤗 I feel like reading some sci-fi alien and cyborg romance will cover quite a few prompts. I know that Stay Horny Golden Girl came from an alien romance review, so that would work nicely. It would also easily cover Bonkers Romance and probably Scientists in 2022. If I go with a cyborg sci-fi, that would work nicely for Jimmi Simpson's Robot Adventure.

🤗 For the Ancient Egyptian Glory Hole, I remember there was a trope Tuesday post on instagram that was romances to read if you loved The Mummy. I know there's been a couple other historical romances that have been said to have adventure themes and Indiana Jones vibes. I will definitely need to try to find those posts. I know I added a lot of the books to my tbr on goodreads, but I think it'll be quicker to find the instagram post and see what books were rec'd.

🤗 For Scientists in 2022, my first though was Ali Hazelwood. She wrote The Love Hypothesis last year and has her next book out tentatively this year. She also has three shorter books that are also set in STEM fields.

🤗 For St. Vincent Would Always, I think I'll just pick up a Lisa Kleypas. St. Vincent is the hero from Devil in Winter. I do have the prequel book in the Wallflowers series to read still, but I think I'm going to use any Lisa Kleypas to cover this.

🤗 My last quick idea is to pick up some highlander books for the prompts Englandtimes Highlander Vegas or Jazz Bagpipes. I could also go for a contemporary set in Scotland or with a Scottish main character. I know that Karen Marie Moning has some time traveling highlanders in her Highlander series, so I might finally pick that up.

I hope those quickfire ideas helped jogged your brain in coming up with some ideas, but I'm excited to see how I'm going to fill all these prompts. I hope you are participating as well, even if you don't listen to the podcast! Everyone can get embraced for their reading this way!

Bookishly Yours,

Stasi🍎

Heaving Bosom's Reading Embrace

Update: As of 5/17/2021 I have completed the Heaving Bosoms Reading Embrace! Feel free to check out reviews below or check out the reading embrace tag!

 Happy Hump Day!

This is going to be my tracking list for the Heaving Bosom's Reading Embrace! Please join me in this year long embrace (all the hugs are needed)! I will update as I go along.

1. Darkness Button - The Highwayman by Kerrigan Byrne - finished 1/20/2021

2. Defcon Most Extreme - A Notorious Vow by Joanna Shupe - finished 1/17/2021

3. England Times America -  A Daring Arrangement by Joanna Shupe - finished 1/17/2021

4. Furrrrrr - Bound to a Warrior by Donna Fletcher - finished 1/27/2021

5. Ghost Boner - Dangerous by Amanda Quick - finished 1/10/2021

6. HB Author - Saving Verakko by Victoria Aveline - finished 3/31/2021

7. Holy Cats, That's a Nice Nipple! - The Hunter by Kerrigan Byrne - finished 1/28/2021

8. Keep Being a Badass - My Darling Duke by Stacy Reid - finished 1/22/2021

9. Lady Love - That Scandalous Evening by Christina Dodd - finished 1/16/2021

10. Morality Boner - The Gilded Web by Mary Balogh - finished 1/9/2021

11. Murder Smolder - The Duke by Kerrigan Byrne - finished 1/30/2021

12. Never Seen Snow Before - The Highlander by Kerrigan Byrne - finished 1/29/2021

13. Orgasms and Waffles - A Big Surprise for Valentine's Day by Jackie Lau - finished 2/14/2021

14. Remembering Things in 2021 - Love Lettering by Kate Clayborn - finished 1/25/2021

15. Roll Butter - The Scot Beds His Wife by Kerrigan Byrne - finished 1/31/2021

16. Royal Boner - The Sea King by C.L. Wilson - finished 1/6/2021

17. The Seven Seas - A Scandalous Deal by Joanna Shupe - finished 1/17/2021

18. The Sheriff of My Vagina - The Lost Duke of Wyndham by Julia Quinn - finished 1/16/2021

19. Traditional Naperville Tree Lighting - Once Upon a Christmas Eve by Elizabeth Hoyt - finished 5/17/2021

20. War Horniness - The Beast of Blackmoor by Milla Vane - finished 2/6/2021

Bookishly Yours,

Stasi🍎

Forms and Tracking

Happy New Moon in Capricorn!

I'm still up in the air on doing quick reviews either weekly bi-monthly, or what my schedule is going to be exactly, however I think to make things more achievable I'm going to go based on how much I'm reading and what else is going on. Hopefully this weekend I'll get my first few reviews up!

Today, however, I'd like to go over what I'm doing for tracking yearly challenges I've signed up for.

I know there are a lot of different ways to track your reading, the easiest being just using Goodreads. I wanted to do some more statistical work (nerd alert!) on what I'm reading and thought it'd be fun to look at pie and column charts at the end of the year. So, after looking at several different options (google sheets, air table, etc.), I've settled on Google Forms. I created a form that tracks the information I'd like to extrapolate on. I heard about this from the podcast Black Chick Lit and loved the idea. As I submit responses it'll auto-sync into a google sheet, which can then easily be used to create all the fun (and nerdy) statistics I'll enjoy looking at. In case anybody is interested in the form, here is a link to a copy. Feel free to make a copy for yourself and adjust as needed!

It's just a start (and I've only read a few books so far), but see the below screenshot of what my statistical sheet is currently set up as (and most definitely subject to change).

As for yearly reading challenges, I've officially signed up for two (so far). One is the basic, Goodreads reading challenge. I only put 150 for this year. Not sure why, but I just though I'd lower by goal this year. This will still be easily met though since several times in a year I get in "I only want to read" moods. Also, with this blog I'm going to participating and allowing myself to be more accountable in book clubs and read-a-thons. The second reading "challenge" I've joined is Heaving Bosom's Reading Embrace. It's a low key (20 books) challenge that has themes based on funny things that have happened on the podcast. (P.S. Heaving Bosoms is my second favorite romancelandia podcast and I love Melody and Erin's banter. It always has me laughing along!)

To keep up with tracking on these challenges, I'll add the goodreads widget that shows my progress to a sidebar. I will (hopefully soon) be doing a post that I can update as needed for the Reading Embrace (and link once it's up). Feel free to join me in these and any challenges upcoming!

Bookishly Yours,

Stasi 🍎